EU Privacy Migration Wave — Engineers Leaving US Cloud for EU Infra
The Problem
US hyperscalers hold 70% of the European cloud infrastructure market as of 2025, with European providers at only 15%, driving engineers and companies to seek EU-only infrastructure for data sovereignty amid regulations like message scanning proposals.[1][2] A survey shows 60% of Western European CIOs want more local cloud use, fueled by compliance needs in regulated sectors like healthcare and banking.[1][2] The sovereign cloud market currently generates over EUR 20bn annually, projected to exceed EUR 100bn by 2031, indicating massive spending intent as firms migrate from US providers.[1]
Real Demand Evidence
Found on hackernews ↗·2 days ago
We spent three months mapping all our US data flows before we could even start migrating to EU infra. There is no tooling that makes this straightforward — it is all manual audit work.
Core Insight
Easy migration tool with AWS-like APIs, one-click Terraform templates for EU-only stacks, and built-in compliance dashboards—filling gaps in enterprise-focused UIs, limited dev tools, and poor automation of competitors like OVHcloud and Hetzner.
- Target Customer
- Indie hackers and solo founders building SaaS products for EU markets, needing compliant infra without enterprise complexity; part of 15% EU provider market serving SMBs, with total addressable sovereign cloud market at EUR 20bn+ growing rapidly.[1][2]
- Revenue Model
- Usage-based pay-as-you-go starting at $5/month for core migration features, with premium tiers at $29-$99/month for advanced compliance monitoring and auto-scaling, undercutting IONOS/Hetzner entry prices while matching Scaleway hourly flexibility.
Competitive Landscape
Public Cloud: from €0.013/hour for smallest instance (c2-7: 2 vCPU, 7GB RAM); Dedicated servers from €49/month
OVHcloud's public cloud is based on OpenStack, which has a steeper learning curve for indie hackers accustomed to AWS-like APIs and lacks seamless Terraform integration for rapid prototyping. It focuses more on enterprise-scale deployments rather than solo founder agility.
Cloud servers from €3.29/month (CX11: 2 vCPU, 2GB RAM, 20GB SSD)
Hetzner excels in low-cost VMs but offers limited managed services like Kubernetes or databases, forcing solo founders to handle more DevOps overhead. Its API is basic compared to hyperscalers, complicating automation for complex migrations.
Instances from €0.0056/hour (DEV1-S: 2 vCPU, 2GB RAM); Elements pricing starts at €3.99/month
Scaleway's eco-friendly focus leads to fewer instance types and regions, limiting options for high-performance workloads needed in AI/ML experiments by indie hackers. Terraform support is present but documentation lags for edge cases in sovereignty compliance.
Cloud servers from €0.01/hour (1 vCPU, 1GB RAM); Flexible plans from €1/month
IONOS targets hosting and SMBs with less emphasis on developer tools like serverless or advanced networking, making it less ideal for indie hackers building scalable apps. Its dashboard is clunky for quick iterations compared to modern UIs.
Standard instances from CHF 0.007/hour (~€0.007); Minimum €5/month commitment
Exoscale provides solid OpenStack-based services but has smaller scale and fewer global EU regions, restricting redundancy for mission-critical indie projects. Pricing transparency for add-ons like backups is poor.
Willingness to Pay
- EUR 20bn current annual revenue for European sovereign cloud market
60% of CIOs and IT leaders in Western Europe want to increase their use of local cloud providers.
https://news.broadcom.com/sovereign-cloud/three-predictions-for-sovereign-cloud-in-2026
- EUR 20bn to EUR 100bn
Total European market for sovereign cloud services projected to grow from just over EUR 20bn in annual revenue today, to over EUR 100bn in 2031.
https://news.broadcom.com/sovereign-cloud/three-predictions-for-sovereign-cloud-in-2026
- $16 billion (North America sovereign spend)
Global sovereign cloud spend to increase 35.6% in 2026, with North America at $16 billion.
https://www.ciodive.com/news/global-sovereign-cloud-spend-increase-2026/811896/
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